Easter II: Living God’s Embrace – David Brubacher – April 19/09

It happened a long time ago, but I can still feel the strong 11 year old emotions. I was walking by my little brother’s high chair with a bowl of hot soup. As I walked by my little brother reached into the soup.  My brother’s cry was distressing for me. But that was not the worst. My parent’s reprimand for being too close, with the added words, “You should have known better,” was more than I could handle. I can still feel the anguish with which I wailed, “It’s not fair! How was I to know! You don’t understand!”  Being the oldest I naturally felt responsible. If you are the oldest, you know what I mean. But the words “You are the oldest, you should have known better,” was more than I could handle. I broke out into an eleven year old protest.  Today I have the advantage of looking back at that episode with a maturity I lacked then. My parents were right. I was too close. I should have been more careful. But at the time I could not separate what I was feeling about my “self” from my parents, the “other” that I protested against.

The question of how we relate to those we would name as “other” is an issue at every stage of life. And it is an issue in the church, particularly in the church. I say that from the vantage point of having worked in a denominational office with the responsibility of walking with congregations in the joys and struggles of life together. Let me simply say, I have seen the best and the worst, sometimes within the same congregation. During those years I came to the conclusion that as Christians we do not work with enough intentionality in understanding how we relate to those we somehow name as “other” in our lives.  The one we name as “other” might be a one of another race, nationality or culture; hold a different viewpoint to our own; be of a personal temperament that we find difficult; be of a different sexual orientation and the list goes on. Given that as Anabaptist-Mennonites we place a high value on community, how do we make room for our differences? In today’s world we are profoundly aware of broad ranges of diversity. How do we hold our own convictions while making room for others? Or can we?

For me, these are profound questions as we seek to be follows of Jesus in a pluralistic society where diversity is increasingly the expected norm. Given the reality of the world in which we live, and TUMC’s expressed value of, and commitment to – being a Christian community, it came as little surprise that the first initiative for action following last year’s exercise of naming our identity and purpose was, “Building an experience of community with intentional welcome and integration of all people into the life of TUMC.”

Beginning today, the preaching team is embarking on a sermon series to address some of the issues and opportunities as we think about welcome and inclusion in the context of our diverse world. On one level the series is about welcome and hospitality, but it is more than that. It is also an attempt to get at some of the roots of inhospitality that grow deeply alongside our desire for community. The series title is “Living God’s Embrace: Who can measure?”  The language of the title, and in some respect the thinking of the series itself, is influenced by Miroslav Volf’s book, Exclusion and Embrace: A theological exploration of identity, otherness, and reconciliation. Volf writes the book as a Croatian, at the time living in a multicultural North American urban context, reflecting on his lingering feelings around the events in his former homeland, Yugoslavia. How could he as a Croat make room for Serbians, in his life? How could be bring together personal experience, theological conviction and current reality into one life giving image?

The Apostle Paul’s words in Romans 15:7, “Welcome one another, therefore, just as Christ has welcomed you,…” inspired for Volf the metaphor of embrace. For Volf, embrace suggests a drama which brings together various aspects of life experience to shape a new reality.  As a preaching team we are also aware that we are in the season moving from Easter towards Pentecost. The denominational material put together for this season comes under the title, “None can stop the Spirit!” During this season we celebrate the new life that is ours in Jesus Christ. Victorious over the fear of death, refreshed by the wind of the Spirit, empowered by the almighty power of God, we can enter the joy of being in Christian community. The blessings of being in a Christian community are many. Maintaining healthy Christian community and embracing our God-given diversi
ty is hard work. It only happens by the power of God’s Spirit at work in the lives of God’s people.  

While the way we are naming the issue may grow out of current realities, the issue is as old as time itself. Its stories are woven into the fabric of our biblical text. Genesis 12:1-3 significantly shapes my thinking on relating to the “other” or the “stranger” in our lives. It is significant both in what it says and in the place where it appears in the biblical text.  God’s call to Abram, later known as Abraham, is marked by promise and blessing. Abram is called to leave the security of the life he had come to know, even though he had no land to call home and no biological heir. In exchange for a promise of land and heirs Abram packed and left for an unknown future. God sealed the promise saying, “I will bless you, and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing…, and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.”

In terms of the later Hebrew/Jewish identity where the world consisted of Jews and Gentiles, the way Abram’s call is framed is of great significance. For a Jew of this time, the Gentile was the primary “other.” Abram’s call included a promise that God would make him a blessing to all families of the earth, including Gentiles. I wonder what it might mean for us, heirs of Abram’s call and promise through Jesus Christ, to be blessing to all people, even those we see as “other?”  Genesis 12 is widely agreed to be the beginning of the record of God’s calling and interacting with a people called to fulfill God’s purpose in the world. In that case the posture of blessing toward those we might consider “other” is present at the very beginning of God’s call to a set apart people. Fulfilling God’s purpose in the world is about being a blessing. How might our relationship with others be different if we considered whether our actions toward them might be blessing or not?

Throughout history groups of people have sought to withdraw from the “other.” Is that even possible today when we are co-mingled with those who are different than we are in virtual every aspect of life?  Miroslav Volf reflects on a world without the other in remembering the first time he entered Croatia since it had declared independence. The state insignia and flags were displayed everywhere. He could sense a charge in the air that something was different. Before Yugoslavia was dismantled one was almost expected to apologize for being a Croat. Now he felt free to be who he was. Yet the longer he was in the country the more hemmed in he began to feel. He sensed an unexpressed expectation to explain why he still had friends in Serbia and did not talk about Serbia with disgust. The new Croatia, he discovered was like a jealous goddess who wanted all of his love and all of his loyalty.

What Volf describes is the down side of developing ones identity and sense of self in the context of those who are largely of a single mind. The tendency is to seek unity based on what the group is against. From my experience in the church such a coming together does not make for unity. Lasting unity comes when self-articulated individuals are able to stand alongside those they may name as “other” and find common ground.  Volf describes this coming together as “the drama of embrace.” He articulates the basic thought behind the drama or metaphor of embrace this way: “the will to give ourselves to others and ‘welcome’ them, to readjust our identities to make space for them, is prior to any judgment about others, except that of identifying them in their humanity.”

I see in Volf’s words a reflection of Paul’s writing in Philippians 2:5-11. We heard this text read on Palm Sunday when the Inter-Mennonite Children’s Choir was here. As one commentator notes Jesus rode into Jerusalem bobbing along on a donkey clearly out of step with many who expected the Messiah to ride into Jerusalem on a white war horse like a conquering hero. The way that Paul calls us to relate to each other may also be out of step with what many think today, but it is the way of the risen Christ whose Spirit moves among us.  Paul’s letter to the Philippians contains mixed emotions. Joy and thanksgiving reflects the strength of Paul’s relationship with the church in their continued partnership with his ministry. The underside is that Paul is in prison as he writes to address dissension within the congregation.

Paul avoids laying a heavy guilt trip on them. Rather he nourishes this troubled group by reminding them of what they already know. He draws them into the story of Christ’s suffering on the cross to remind them of God’s unconditional love. Paul is preparing his readers to embrace the mindset of Christ in their relationship with others. For Paul there was no place in the body of Christ for a selfish eye, a pompous mind, a heart that had little room for others and a hand that served only self.

It is widely acknowledged that the well know words read today by Bill DeFehr was an ancient hymn coming from another context to address another problem. What I find interesting is Paul’s choice to employ a hymn, poetry – art if you will, rather than dense lecturing. Even Paul new the capacity art has to engage us on a more emotive level that might lead to changed behaviour.

Again, it will be helpful to ask two questions: What does the hymn say? And what does Paul say by quoting the hymn? The hymn is a rehearsal of the Christ story. In poetic form it affirms that Jesus emptied himself of any Godlikeness to be born in human likeness. Though being like God, he became obedient to the point of death on the cross. In resurrection God exalted him above every name in heaven and on earth and under the earth. Jesus Christ is Lord.  If that is the hymn’s affirmation, what does Paul say in quoting from it? The hymn is not a theological treatise. It is an ancient statement of faith. While what lies behind the hymn may be debated, Paul points to a church distracting itself from its witness by discord and individualism apparently marked by self-serving behaviour.

In citing a hymn, Paul engages the people to remind them of what they already knew and to draw them back into the story. Being engaged in the story of Jesus in our lives is the way to make room for the “other” or the “stranger.” We will need to reenter that story again and again. As God’s Spirit of Pentecost blows among us we are being transformed. That is what Jesus is all about, transformation, not leverage to be used against the “other.” Transformed by the power of the Christ, we will find our true self. In our true self we can stand side by side with the other, making room for them as they also find their God given true self. In that embrace we live in God’s embrace.

For a hymn of response let us sing in the Hymnal #229, “Lord, you have come to the lakeshore.” The song does not necessarily connect thematically to what I have sought to address today. The music and the text reach out to me and draw me into the story – Christ’s story. Let us enter God’s embrace! Amen!